In the new issue of Regulation, economist Pierre Lemieux argues that the recent oil price decline is at least partly the result of increased supply from the extraction of shale oil. The increased supply allows the economy to produce more goods, which benefits some people, if not all of them. Thus, contrary to some commentary in the press, cheaper oil prices cannot harm the economy as a whole.

Two long wars, chronic deficits, the financial crisis, the costly drug war, the growth of executive power under Presidents Bush and Obama, and the revelations about NSA abuses, have given rise to a growing libertarian movement in our country – with a greater focus on individual liberty and less government power. David Boaz’s newly released The Libertarian Mind is a comprehensive guide to the history, philosophy, and growth of the libertarian movement, with incisive analyses of today’s most pressing issues and policies.

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Tag: Commerce Clause

The latest federal judge to declare ObamaCare constitutional claimed that Congress can regulate “mental activity,” like the mental activity of choosing not to purchase health insurance. Or shoes and ships and sealing wax. Or my book.

National Review editor Rich Lowry has an excellent column explaining why this latest, ahem, legal victory for ObamaCare “delivered a more telling blow against the law in the course of ruling it constitutional than critics have in assailing it as a travesty…It’s the most self-undermining defense of the constitutionality of a dubious statute since then–solicitor general Elena Kagan told the Supreme Court that under campaign-finance reform, the government could ban certain pamphlets.”

That’s the title of my latest column at National Review Online. An excerpt:

Mitt Romney isn’t the only Republican presidential hopeful with an Obamacare problem: Indiana governor Mitch Daniels, were he to become the GOP’s nominee, could also undermine the repeal campaign that has united the party’s base and independent voters.

Among his liabilities:

Daniels’s decision to accept Obamacare funds and move forward with implementation is further undermining the repeal effort. Yesterday, federal judge Roger Vinson reversed his initial order forbidding the Obama administration to implement the law. He did so in part because plaintiff states such as Indiana are implementing it, which he said “undercut” their own argument that he should block it.

But all is not lost for Daniels.

Daniels can spare himself and the repeal movement such setbacks by following the lead of Florida governor Rick Scott (R.) and Alaska governor Sean Parnell (R.) and flatly refusing to implement any aspect of Obamacare. Daniels could even organize another letter in which his fellow governors all make the same announcement.

Judge Roger Vinson of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida has just responded to the Obama administration’s “motion to clarify” his prior ruling, which declared ObamaCare unconstitutional and void. That “motion to clarify” essentially asked Vinson, “Didn’t you really mean that we can keep implementing ObamaCare while we appeal your ruling?” Today, Vinson answered, “No.”

The attorneys representing the plaintiffs, who include Florida and 25 other states, argued that the administration’s “motion to clarify” was actually a veiled request to have Vinson stay (i.e., set aside) his original order blocking implementation. Vinson agreed, and therefore treated the Obama administration’s “motion to clarify” as a motion to stay, which he granted. Vinson made clear, however, that if the administration fails to file a notice of appeal by March 10 or fails to seek an expedited appeal either with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court, then his stay will lift and the administration will (once again) be barred from implementing or enforcing ObamaCare. In other words, Vinson prevented the Obama administration from treating his stay as an excuse to ignore his ruling while the further entrenching the law.

It would have been better if Vinson had stuck to his original order blocking implementation. Yet he made clear that one of the reasons he did not is that many of the states asking him to strike down the law are implementing it anyway. Vinson wrote that the case for blocking implementation:

is undercut by the fact that at least eight of the plaintiff states…have represented that they will continue to implement and fully comply with the Act’s requirements — in an abundance of caution while this case is on appeal — irrespective of my ruling.

As the Obama administration explained to the court:

[S]ince the Court entered its judgment on January 31, at least 24 of the 26 plaintiff states have applied for additional grants authorized or appropriated by the ACA, continued to draw down grant funds previously awarded under the ACA, or otherwise availed themselves of resources made available by the ACA. Indeed, South Carolina has continued to drawn down exchange planning grant funds, even though it has declared the Act “void and unenforceable.” Similarly, Utah has described the declaratory judgment as an “injunction against further implementation” of the Act, but has continued to draw down Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan (“PCIP”) funds and to request Early Retiree Reinsurance Program (“ERRP”) reimbursements.

Now would be a good time for the South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R), Utah Gov. Gary Herbert (R), and the governors of the other 22 plaintiff states to join Alaska and Florida in refusing to accept any further ObamaCare funds, returning the ObamaCare funds they have already received, and ceasing all implementation activities, including “planning” efforts.

Tea partiers and other conservative groups turned on House Republicans in a dispute over when the House would vote to cut off all ObamaCare spending. Where’s the outrage over the governors and state legislators that are eagerly pursuing that funding, actively implementing the law, and preventing judges from stopping implementation?

That is, Judge Gladys Kessler, echoing two other district judges who ruled in the government’s favor, found that the decision not to purchase health insurance was itself an action and so reachable by Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause. The activity/inactivity distinction that we Obamacare opponents have been pushing is mere “semantics,” you see. Well, as Randy Barnett said in an emailed press statement:

This decision makes crystal clear that the government is seeking the dangerous and unprecedented power to regulate the economic “decisions” of all Americans – including the decision to refrain from engaging in economic activity. If allowed by the Supreme Court, Americans would be reduced from citizens to the subjects of Congress, which would now have the discretionary power to run their lives.

He’s right, unfortunately. But take a deep breath or breathe a sigh of relief (while both are still legal) because, at the end of the day, this latest ruling adds nothing to the debate except a new appellate court from which we can expect an opinion later this year. (It also ran the record on the “taxing power” argument – the one so favored by the academics I’ve debate over the past year – to 0-4, including two judges who otherwise ruled for the government.)

Look, the arguments on both sides are clear: On the one hand, the federal government cannot require people to engage in economic activity under the guise of regulating commerce. On the other, the decision not to act is itself an action – “mental activity”? – that is subject to regulation. The battle lines are drawn, the armies of lawyers ready. The only remaining question is whether the Supreme Court will ultimately find that there are constitutional limits to federal power.

In yesterday’s Providence Journal, my colleague Ilya Shapiro and I argue that, since a federal court has voided ObamaCare as unconstitutional, the Obama administration should immediately cease all efforts to implement ObamaCare:

Federal courts do not issue advisory opinions. The parties to any lawsuit are bound by any resulting judgment.

At minimum, then, the government lacks authority to implement ObamaCare where the case was decided, in the Northern District of Florida, and the 26 state plaintiffs need take no action to do so. Likewise, members of the National Federation of Independent Business, another plaintiff in the case, may now be entitled to the same protection from Obamacare’s requirements.

Moreover, it is not unreasonable to argue that Vinson’s ruling applies to the nation as a whole. After all, this lawsuit facially attacked the law rather than just challenging its application to particular parties….

In so uncertain a legal context, it is simply reckless for financially strapped federal and state governments to pour resources into changing our health care system when those changes may not ultimately pass constitutional muster.

Governors should follow the example of Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R), who recently told a Cato audience in Naples that Florida will not implement any aspect of ObamaCare. Listen to excerpts from Scott’s remarks here. Read the full Cannon-Shapiro oped here.

Since the New Deal, the court has consistently held that Congress has broad constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce. This includes authority over not just goods moving across state lines, but also the economic choices of individuals within states that have significant effects on interstate markets. By that standard, this law’s constitutionality is open and shut. Does anyone doubt that the multitrillion-dollar health insurance industry is an interstate market that Congress has the power to regulate?

Well, actually, Prof. Tribe, you’re asking and answering the wrong questions, as I say in my letter to the editor that appeared in the Sunday Times:

First, this is indeed a “novel” issue for the Supreme Court: Never before has the federal government asserted the power to require people to engage in economic activity under the guise of regulating commerce.

Second, those challenging the law do not question Congress’s power to regulate the “multitrillion-dollar health insurance industry,” but rather distinguish such regulation from a command for individuals to purchase that industry’s products.

Third, the difference between activity and inactivity is anything but “illusory”; if Congress can regulate mere decisions, then it can tell me, for example, that I shouldn’t spend time writing letters to the editor.

And finally, imagining that Justice Antonin Scalia would support the government here because he previously ratified prohibitions on the production and consumption of marijuana is to remove the very activity-inactivity distinction that he recognized in that earlier opinion.

Most recently, the Times itself editorialized against the views Randy Barnett presented to the Senate Judiciary Committee – and Randy replied here.

Setting aside the issue of why Congress is only now getting around to holding hearings on the constitutionality of a fundamental piece of legislation it passed nearly a year ago, it’s clear now at least that the proponents of limitless, extra-constitutional government are running scared. Obamacare delenda est.

Last week, after I responded to Akhil Amar’s op-ed that defended, in an uncharacteristically unthoughtful and ad hominem way, the constitutionality of the individual mandate, a reader suggested that Amar’s argument – particularly that “breathing is an action” that Congress can regulate – reminded him of that Police classic, “Every Breath You Take.” What’s ironic about this suggestion, perhaps inadvertently, is not only the invocation of “breathing” but that the whole Obamacare battle boils down to competing views of federal power: Does the government have a general “police” power or is its authority limited to that finite set of powers listed in the Constitution?

And so, without further ado, here’s how the song would look updated for 2011’s favorite constitutional debate (with apologies to Gordon Sumner aka Sting):

Every breath you take
Every move you make, or
Decide not to take
Even when you flake
We’re mandating you

Every single day
Every word you say
Every game you play
Even if you stay
We’re coercing you

O don’t you fuss
You belong to us
How we regulate every step you take

Every move you make
Every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
We’re mandating you

The Constitution’s lost without a trace
Since ‘37 we go every place
Limits on government you can’t replace
Got rid of those so we’re always in your face
We’re commanding you, no saying please

Every move you make
Every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
We’re mandating you